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Creepy Sells
https://archive.fo/0cn1t Robert Johnson, Sentinel Staff WriterTHE ORLANDO SENTINEL Privacy Policy The scare factor is being ratcheted up at Orlando theme parks this year, with more nights of special events, new shows and a whole new venue for the biggest boo of all --Universal Orlando's Halloween Horror Nights. Theme park marketers realize that special events at Halloween are huge profit generators. In fact, Universal Orlando's Halloween Horror Nights, which began earlier this month and ends Nov. 2, are the attraction's biggest money-makers of the entire year. This year, Universal added two nights to the event, switched it to Islands of Adventure from the less-edgy Universal Studios and dumped the popular Jack the clown icon in favor of the even darker "Caretaker," a fictional mortician. The marketing strategy is clearly working. Horror Nights attendance topped 30,000 on Oct. 5, its first Saturday the first time the event's initial Saturday had sold out. The event also sold out last Saturday. "The demand this year is unprecedented," Universal Orlando spokeswoman Susan Lomax said. Even at Walt Disney World, where Halloween is a smaller and milder event than at Universal, the bar is being raised. The Magic Kingdom's annual "Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party," which was sold out or nearly so in each of its five nights last year, has been expanded to seven evenings in 2002, running through Nov. 1. Disney is considering further expansion of Not-So-Scary, but Linda Warren, an executive vice president, said it will do it prudently. "What we're thinking is that there are limits around Halloween. You may see us expanding with more dates when it's justified by the demand we're seeing." Disney also is touting "13 other ways Disney guests can get into the Halloween spirit," including mostly year-round attractions such as Tower of Terror at MGM Studios and the Haunted Mansion at Magic Kingdom. SeaWorld Orlando is grabbing a piece of the Halloween pie, too. The relatively modest "Shamu's Halloween Spooktacular" has been stretched into a seven-hour experience -- adding 90 minutes to the festivities that are held Oct. 26 and 27. Halloween Horror Nights and the Not-So-Scary party are after-hour events, and both Universal and Disney raised admission by $2 this year. SeaWorld's event is part of the regular day's activities and there isn't an additional admission price. At a time when attendance is still struggling at Orlando theme parks during regular operating hours, the strength of Halloween is a profit highlight. "The Halloween market is one area that didn't get hurt by September 11. Maybe it's an outlet that a lot of people need," said Leonard Pickel, editor in chief of Haunted Attractions magazine in Charlotte, N.C. Is there a point where the events reach the saturation point for Halloween in Orlando? "No one knows," said Peter Stapp, a former Universal executive who is now an attractions designer at Baker Leisure Group in Orlando. "You don't want to go beyond the limits of an event's appeal. This is an attraction where you spend extra money on advertising and staffing. Saturation wouldn't necessarily mean losing money, but it would erode profits." Last year, sensitive to the post-Sept. 11 psyche of the public, the Horror Nights creators reined in some of their more eerie impulses. Not this year. An advertisement featuring the Caretaker promises, "Look inside your mind and you'll find he's already there, poking, probing, wrenching your deepest, darkest fears out into the light." "The Caretaker is pure evil," said Elaine Hinds, an assistant entertainment director who was part of the team that created the Caretaker. Many guests who have attended Horror Nights before say this year is scarier than last. "Now there's more blood. And the Caretaker is weirder than Jack menacing clown ever was," said Colleen Baxter, a college student from Palm Bay after emerging from the Scream House attraction on Saturday night. So how gory is it? One highlight is a faux hospital operating room in the Scream House with a half-dozen mutilated bodies abandoned on tables. Most have surgical tools still sticking out of them and one is groaning. When he gets your attention, a bloody nurse slips up to catch you unaware. "I screamed the whole time I was in Scream House," said Caroline Taylor, 13, of Orlando. Does that mean she's getting her money's worth? "Oh, for sure," she said. Category:Halloween Horror Nights article